What others are saying about 49ers cornerback Chris Culliver's anti-gay comments, made during a podcast with Artie Lange:

"You know what, guys? You have to be very careful in what you say. I can't elaborate on that or what happened there or even how he got enticed somehow into making that statement."

-- Jerry Rice

"It's going to impact him going forward. It's something that he will learn about himself. ... It will affect him. Hope and pray that it affects him in a positive way going forward."

-- 49ers coach Jim Harbaugh

"You see a football player that had an uninformed opinion, and now he can grow in his sort of experience and be a beacon for everybody in the locker room for the 49ers and hopefully throughout the NFL, to show it's more than what your uninformed, juvenile opinion is of something. And that's what I want to push Chris to do."

-- 49ers CEO Jed York

"Hopefully, there's not (a backlash). But if I was a gambling man, I would probably think there (will be a backlash). That's why the comments that he made were so big, because the city we're actually in, there is a large population of people who are gay. There are probably a large number of people who come to Candlestick Park every weekend that are gay. It was just a mistake by him and I know he wishes he could take it back."

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-- 49ers safety Donte Whitner

"Who knows, there could be someone who's gay in our locker room right now that's scared to come out, which he has a right to be if he is because of all of this and how other teammates might feel. I feel like anybody can be who they want to be as long as you don't disrespect other people and go about your business in your own way."

-- Whitner

"If people hear you say those things, regardless of whether you mean them or not, they're going to fry you for it if it's in a public arena, and your whole reputation is going to be roasted for it. He apologized and hopefully he'll learn. I think he's going to learn and he's going to grow from it and he's going to be a better person for it.''

"Kwame was a great guy. He was a respectful guy. I never knew he was gay. It wouldn't have mattered if I did, just because of the guy he was. He never tried to do anything to anybody, he never said anything disrespectful. He was just a football player in the locker room."

"On this team, with so many different personalities, we just accept people for who they are. We really don't care too much about a person's sexuality. ﻿You know who you are, that's who you are, and we accept you for it."

-- Ravens linebacker Terrell Suggs

"I don't think we should tear a man's head off or a woman's head off just because of their sexual preference. I think we're all good people. I really believe we should be able to look beyond that in this day and age. It's here in our world, it's not like it just came yesterday. So for us to act like, oh my god, this is like a bad disease that just hit our country, it's not."